Re: Whitespace search and regex.c

[Stefan Monnier]

>> It is for the sake of user-level search features that
>> want a series of SPCs to stand for some broader kind of whitespace.

>     I'm afraid that doesn't tell me really what it is for.  I.e. why is it
>     implemented this way rather than some other way?  What was the
>     precise goal?

> This was the easiest way I could find to do it reliably.
> It avoids the need to write other code to parse a regexp.
> I did not want to do that; I figured it would be a pain.

Well, another easy way goes as follows:

      (defun in-brackets-p (regex pos)
        "Return non-nil if POS is within brackets in REGEX."
        (condition-case err
            (progn
              (string-match (substring regex 0 pos) "")
              nil)
          (error (equal (cadr err) "Unmatched [ or [^"))))


-- Stefan